It is occasionally necessary for law enforcement agencies to impede and stop the movement of a speeding motor vehicle. One method of accomplishing this is by direct pursuit of the vehicle by the vehicles that are used by the agency. However, direct pursuit is a risky proposition since it can and does have the potential for placing the pursuers and the public at large in harm's way, particularly when such pursuits lead through city streets and other populated areas. As one safer alternative to the direct pursuit of an illegally speeding vehicle, it has been recognized that strategic placement of tire-deflating mechanisms in the path, or the anticipated path, of the vehicle can also effectively impede and stop its movement. Such portable tire-deflating mechanisms often take the form of strips of material that can be set down on a roadway, the strips including some sort of puncturing device attached to it. Mechanisms of this type can, in the experience of this inventor, be deployed with relative ease and have taken several forms in recent years. One such mechanism, invented by this inventor, is formed with a “scissors-like” base having a plurality of tire-puncturing spikes that are removably held within the base. That mechanism, including the detail of the tire-deflating spikes that are used with it, is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,357,961 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,312,189 issued to this inventor, respectively.
In the experience of this inventor, the tire-puncturing spike and retainer assembly as described above has worked superbly in the field. Notwithstanding the improved method of retaining a tire-deflating spike within its assembly, as is disclosed and claimed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,357,961 mentioned above, there are still situations where the vehicle sought to be slowed down or stopped runs over the assembly with such force and in such a violent fashion that the assembly “whiplashes” under or behind the vehicle thereby causing a few extra spikes to be thrown from the assembly. Furthermore, it is this inventor's intended use of the assembly that all spikes that do not have direct tire contact not to be affected and remain intact within the assembly, even when the assembly is whiplashed in this fashion. Accordingly, it is this inventor's intention to further improve the original design of his assembly to further reduce the possibility of spikes being inadvertently deployed when there is no tire contact whatsoever and to do so in such a way as to avoid dramatic alteration of his current configuration of the overall assembly.